Content delivery

ABSTRACT

A system and method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment is provided where the method includes storing advertising content into a content database, integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment, populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content, associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell and displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application relates to U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,264 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0001-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,344 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0002-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,345 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0003-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,346 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0004-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,351 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0005-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,352 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0006-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/923,353 (Atty. Docket No. IGA-0007-P), filed Apr. 12, 2007, all of which are incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This disclosure relates generally to in-game advertising and more particularly to a method for delivering advertising content in a gaming environment.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

As the placement of realistic advertisements in video games becomes more popular and acceptable in the gaming community, more and more video games are beginning to utilize video game advertisements as a viable source of revenue. Currently, most video games that employ realistic advertisements typically utilize a static advertising technique that involves placing each advertisement in one site throughout game play. As such, the location of the advertisement cannot change or move and other advertisements cannot take its place. Thus, although there may be multiple advertisements in one game, each advertisement can only occupy a single location throughout the entire game. This is undesirable because it lacks the ability to maximize the effect of the advertisement on the gamer.

One way to increase the effectiveness of the advertisement on the gamer is to utilize real-time dynamic advertising techniques which allow for the targeting of advertisements to specific garners or groups of gamers. These dynamic advertising techniques allow multiple advertisements from different advertisers to be rotated through the same site during game play. Moreover, these dynamic advertising techniques allow for different content types, such as Billboard, Logo, Video, Audio and Beacons, to be used to display advertisements to the gamer. Each of these content types is capable of receiving and displaying multiple advertisements throughout the game for display to the gamer. For example, a racing game may have a billboard display advertising one product as the racing car goes around the curve and passes the billboard. However, subsequent times the race car goes around the curve and passes the billboard, entirely different advertisements may be displayed. Thus, dynamic advertising not only enhances the reality of the game's content, it maximizes the revenue generating capability of the software product by generating multiple revenue streams, as opposed to one revenue stream generated using static advertising techniques.

Unfortunately however, several problems exist with current in-game advertising content delivery methods. First, current delivery methods do not allow for the efficient delivery of content to a game. And second, current delivery methods do not allow for the easy and effective targeting of advertisements based on specific needs. For example, because different geographic areas have different products, businesses and needs specific to that geographic area, it is currently very difficult to adequately target the advertisement impressions to a specific geographic audience.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

A method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment is provided and includes storing advertising content into a content database, integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment, populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content, associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell and displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell.

A system for implementing a method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment is provided and includes a means for storing advertising content into a content database, a means for integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment, a means for populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content, a means for associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell and a means for displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell

A computer readable storage medium having computer executable instructions for implementing a method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment is provided and includes storing advertising content into a content database, integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment; populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content, associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell and displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The foregoing and other features and advantages of the present invention will be more fully understood from the following detailed description of illustrative embodiments, taken in conjunction with the accompanying figures in which like elements are numbered alike:

FIG. 1 is a high level schematic block diagram illustrating one embodiment of a gaming system, in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a lower level schematic block diagram illustrating the integration server of the embodiment of the gaming system of FIG. 1, in accordance with the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating one embodiment of a method for delivering advertising content, in accordance with the present invention; and

FIG. 4 is a schematic block diagram of a method for delivering advertising content, in accordance with FIG. 3.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram illustrating one embodiment for populating a cache file with content, in accordance with the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

It should be appreciated that the present invention allows for delivery of advertising content based upon one or more desired parameters, such as the age of the game player and/or the geographic location of a user of the game. This provides the capability of targeting specific populations and/or geographic locations with specific advertisements, wherein advertising content may be selected (dynamically or statically) according to a predetermined set of rules or guidelines based upon predetermined parameters, such as the user's location, the user and the gaming application. Although the invention is discussed herein in terms of a Software Development Kit (SDK), it should be appreciated that any type and/or configuration of application software may be used to practice the invention, such as a generic SDK and/or an application specific SDK. Furthermore, the software application may also be embedded, in whole or in part.

In accordance with the present invention, although the concepts as discussed herein are discussed with regards to a gaming environment as follows, any type of gaming environment or configuration may be used. Referring to FIG. 1, one embodiment of a gaming system 10 for implementing the method of the invention showing the connectivity between the elements is shown and includes a user gaming device 20 having gaming software 30 and application software (SDK) 40, a gaming server 50 (optional) and an integration server 60 which includes advertiser information 70. In accordance with the present invention, a gaming server is optional and the game may be wholly or partially implemented via one or more computer(s) and/or gaming device(s) as desired. During gameplay, the gaming software 30 communicates with the gaming server 50 (optional) to facilitate the gameplay and the SDK 40 communicates with the integration server 60 to facilitate the integration of advertising content. Referring to FIG. 2, a lower level block diagram illustrating the elements of the integration server 60. As shown, the interaction within the integration server 60 is illustrated by a first set of arrows 75 which represents the flow of impressions through the integration server 60, a second set of arrows 80 which represents the flow of advertising content through the integration server 60 and a third set of arrows 85 which represents the flow of control messages (i.e. figuring out a user location, start session message, etc.) through the integration server 60. It is contemplated that any type of advertising content may be implemented with the invention, including but not limited to 3-Dimensional and/or holographic content.

One embodiment of the present invention is described hereinafter and includes application software, such as a Software Development Kit (SDK), which initiates a gaming session by communicating a StartSession request with the server, wherein the server uses the IP address of the connected peer(s) (i.e. the initiator of the gaming session) to lookup a unique location ID associated with the geographical location of the IP address. Once the geographical location of the IP address is identified, the latitude/longitude position(s) of the geographical location of the IP address can be mapped to unique location IDs to allow an advertiser to target media to a specific market(s). It should be appreciated that this dynamic market assignment may be based on one or a plurality of parameters/properties as desired, such as (but not limited to) location ID (based on latitude/longitude of client's IP address), user ID (a unique number associated with each player), application ID (a unique number associated with each game title), business rules logic, predetermined business rules, dynamic market assignment executed by business rules and business rules that may be defined in the application and executed by the location server at each request. For example, a request in this context may be a software call for an assignment to a content server.

Referring to FIG. 3 and FIG. 4, a schematic block diagram illustrating one example of a method 100 for delivering content is shown, in accordance with the present invention, and includes storing advertising content in the database, as shown in operational block 102 and cells (areas where the advertising content is to be displayed) are integrated into the game, as shown in operational block 104. It should be appreciated that zones may or may not be used. Where zones are used, each zone may have a zone property (which may be represented by a numerical value) that may be appended to a cell and/or the content to be displayed in the cell and which may also be used to determine the general location (zone) of the content item. Where zones are not used, each cell may have a list of content that may be associated with it, wherein the association of content to cells may be predetermined via any method suitable to the desired end purpose, such as (but not limited to) by an advertiser based on the types of content that each cell is allowed to accept. It should be further appreciated that each cell may also have a zone property (that way the cell knows which zone to go into).

When the game starts, the advertising content starts to populate the cache file, which may or may not be located on the user's PC, as shown in operational block 106. When the application software (e.g. SDK) calls for advertising content, at least a portion of the advertising content may be replicated into the game from the cache file and displayed on the screen, as shown in operational block 108, where each piece of content may have properties associated with it that describe what type of content it is so that it will be displayed in the correct type of cell. It should be appreciated that the content (or any portion thereof) may be selected via any method suitable to the desired end purpose. For example, one embodiment may include a piece of content being chosen at random from a list of content associated with the cell, where the randomness of selection may be weight based to influence the probability of some content being selected over other content. Moreover, the cell type and/or the content type may have certain properties as desired (for example, a 1×2 billboard BMP may only be displayed in a 1×2 billboard cell).

It should also be appreciated that advertising content may be paired with a zone, when zones are used. Content may also be paired with a cell, based on several parameters as desired (such as ad unit type, format, aspect ratio, etc.), one of which may be zone. A cell may also have an ID assigned as desired, such as on the basis of its aspect ratio, file format and/or zone. For example, during game play, the software application may send a cell ID and in order to determine the zone, the system may look up the properties associated with the cell ID to see with which zone the cell may be associated. The server may then send the correct content to the cell based on the cell ID. In certain embodiments, the zone may not influence the content-cell match at this point, but the content zones and cell zones may match zones because the content may only be allowed to be displayed in certain zones. Accordingly, although a cell may be configured to accept any type of content, the cell may only be allowed to accept content from a certain zone. For example, consider the situation where the game title producer wants to run only a particular piece of advertising content in the menu screen zone. In the booking phase, that piece of content may get associated with Zone A, where a cell within Zone A may be created and assigned a cell ID of 123. Thus, whenever cell 123 displays, only the content with the Zone A property may be displayed in that cell, which may or may not be the only cell that displays in the menu screen.

Referring to FIG. 5, a block diagram illustrating one embodiment of a method 200 for populating the cache file with content, in accordance with the present invention. The cache file may be populated according to a predetermined parameter, such as a characteristic of a user, is shown and includes associating IP addresses with location ID translations, where a database of IP addresses to location ID translations may be loaded onto an IP location server, as shown in operational block 202. Location data which is responsive to the IP address is obtained and/or generated as desired, such as by mapping ranges of IP addresses to unique market identifiers, as shown in operational block 204, and a remote server is connected with the IP location server, as shown in operational block 206. One way this may be accomplished is by a client initiating a connection to the remote server where the remote server then communicates the IP addresses of the client, the application ID and/or the user ID to the IP location server, as shown in operational block 208. The IP location server may then cross-reference the IP addresses with a unique location ID, as shown in operational block 210. The IP location server executes predetermined business rules using predetermined and/or dynamic parameters, as shown in operational block 212, where the parameters may be stored in the IP server or communicated remotely, such as by remote server. This allows for the determination of 1) what market-ID to assign to a user, and 2) which content-server may be the most appropriate for serving content to the user.

In accordance with the invention, some examples of business rules may include (but not be limited to) content limitation (i.e. not displaying a piece of content in areas (such as countries) where the product is not available, controlled content marketing time (i.e. only displaying content a week before a television show airs) and using different servers based on different parameters (such as the game type, the users, the locations, etc.)) Additionally, dynamic marketing assignments may be used to assign a user(s) to a specific market and may eventually affect what server the user is assigned to, using any number of metrics, such as time of day, geography, user ID, latitude, longitude, etc. One or more target content servers can then be selected via the remote server according to predetermined guidelines or parameters, as shown in operational block 114, wherein the target content server returns its address to the remote server and the remote server communicates the content server address to the original requesting client. The client is then free to make subsequent content requests from the content server(s) specified by the remote server.

It should be further appreciated that the method of the present invention may be embodied, in whole or in part, via software, firmware and/or hardware. Accordingly, the invention may be implemented via any type or configuration of software suitable to the desired end purpose, such as a generic SDK and/or an application specific SDK. Additionally, it should also be appreciated that the method of the present invention may be embodied, in whole or in part, via instruction using training manuals (i.e. text based materials), seminars, classes, and/or any other media suitable to the desired end purpose. Moreover, it should be appreciated that although the method of the present invention may be implemented, in whole or in part, via software, hardware, firmware and/or any combination thereof, it is also contemplated that the method of the present invention may also be implemented, in whole or in part, without the use of software, hardware, firmware and/or any combination thereof. For example, without the full or partial use of any software, hardware and/or firmware and/or with any combination thereof, but rather via instruction using PC based software and/or classroom instruction with text materials (i.e. books, pamphlets, handouts, tapes, optical media, etc.).

Moreover, it should be appreciated that each of the elements of the present invention may be implemented in part, or in whole, in any order suitable to the desired end purpose. In accordance with an exemplary embodiment, the processing required to practice the method of the present invention, either in whole or in part, may be implemented, wholly or partially, by a controller operating in response to a machine-readable computer program. In order to perform the prescribed functions and desired processing, as well as the computations therefore (e.g. execution control algorithm(s), the control processes prescribed herein, and the like), the controller may include, but not be limited to, a processor(s), computer(s), memory, storage, register(s), timing, interrupt(s), communication interface(s), and input/output signal interface(s), as well as combination comprising at least one of the foregoing. It should also be appreciated that the embodiments disclosed herein are for illustrative purposes only and include only some of the possible embodiments contemplated by the present invention.

Furthermore, the invention may be wholly or partially embodied in the form of a computer or controller implemented processes. It should be appreciated that any type of computer (as is well known in the art) and/or gaming system may be used and that the invention may be implemented via any type of network setup, including but not limited to a LAN and/or a WAN (wired or wireless). The invention may also be embodied in the form of computer program code containing instructions embodied in tangible media, such as floppy diskettes, CD-ROMs, hard drives, and/or any other computer-readable medium, wherein when the computer program code is loaded into and executed by a computer or controller, the computer or controller becomes an apparatus for practicing the invention. The invention can also be embodied in the form of computer program code, for example, whether stored in a storage medium, loaded into and/or executed by a computer or controller, or transmitted over some transmission medium, such as over electrical wiring or cabling, through fiber optics, or via electromagnetic radiation, wherein when the computer program code is loaded into and executed by a computer or a controller, the computer or controller becomes an apparatus for practicing the invention. When implemented on a general-purpose microprocessor the computer program code segments may configure the microprocessor to create specific logic circuits.

While the invention has been described with reference to an exemplary embodiment, it should be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted for elements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. In addition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the teachings of the invention without departing from the scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the invention not be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best mode contemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the invention will include all embodiments falling within the scope of the appended claims. Moreover, unless specifically stated any use of the terms first, second, etc. do not denote any order or importance, but rather the terms first, second, etc. are used to distinguish one element from another. 

1. A method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment, the method comprising: storing advertising content into a content database; integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment; populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content; associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell; and displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein said associating includes associating at least one IP address with at least one location ID translation.
 3. The method of claim 2, further comprising loading said at least one IP address to at least one location ID translation onto an IP location server.
 4. The method of claim 3, further comprising generating location data by mapping at least one IP address to at least one unique market identifier.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein said associating further includes connecting a remote server with an IP location server.
 6. The method of claim 5, wherein said associating further includes communicating at least one of an IP address of the user, an application ID and a user ID to said IP location server.
 7. The method of claim 1, wherein said associating further includes associating an IP address of a user with a unique location ID.
 8. The method of claim 5, further comprising executing predetermined business rules using predetermined parameters.
 9. The method of claim 8, wherein said predetermined parameters are responsive to at least one of a market-ID assigned to the user and which content-server may be the most appropriate for serving content to the user.
 10. A system for implementing a method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment, the system comprising: a means for storing advertising content into a content database; a means for integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment; a means for populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content; a means for associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell; and a means for displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell.
 11. The method of claim 10, further includes coding content cells into the gaming environment.
 12. The method of claim 10, wherein said associating includes associating at least one IP address with at least one location ID translation.
 13. The method of claim 12, further comprising loading said at least one IP address to at least one location ID translation onto an IP location server.
 14. The method of claim 13, further comprising generating location data by mapping at least one IP address to at least one unique market identifier.
 15. The method of claim 10, wherein said associating further includes connecting a remote server with an IP location server.
 16. The method of claim 15, wherein said associating further includes communicating at least one of an IP address of the user, an application ID and a user ID to said IP location server.
 17. The method of claim 10, wherein said associating further includes associating an IP address of a user with a unique location ID.
 18. The method of claim 15, further comprising executing predetermined business rules using predetermined parameters.
 19. The method of claim 18, wherein said predetermined parameters are responsive to at least one of a market-ID assigned to the user and which content-server may be the most appropriate for serving content to the user
 20. A computer readable storage medium having computer executable instructions for implementing a method for delivering advertising content to a game title gaming environment, the method comprising: storing advertising content into a content database; integrating content data cells into the game title gaming environment; populating the cache file on a users gaming system with the advertising content; associating at least a portion of the advertising content in the cache file with at least one content cell; and displaying the associated advertising content on a gaming screen via the at least one content cell. 